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Shipt shoppers are organizing a handful of actions in protest of Shipt’s new pay structure that began rolling out this month.  The first action is happening from Saturday, Oct. 17 through Oct. 19, when workers are calling on their fellow Shipt shoppers to walk out and boycott the company. Organizers are asking for shoppers not to schedule any hours or accept any orders during that time.

“Our goal is to draw attention to the fact that this pay scale really does affect shoppers and regardless of Shipt’s position of it taking into account effort and benefitting shoppers, we are finding it is the opposite on both fronts,” Willy Solis, a Shipt shopper in Dallas and lead organizer at Gig Workers Collective, told TechCrunch. “It’s not holding up to the true reality. We are getting paid less for more effort.”

Shipt shoppers also plan to stage a direct action at Target’s corporate headquarters in Minneapolis, Minnesota on Monday, October 19. During the action, shoppers plan to read letters written to Shipt CEO Kelly Caruso that describe how the pay changes have impacted them.

Shipt shoppers have been speaking out against this new pay model since earlier this year, after Shipt started testing this new pay structure. In February, a Shipt shopper from Kalamazoo told me they were losing about 30% or more of their regular pay as a result of the change.

According to Target-owned Shipt, it’s doing this to “better account for the actual effort it takes to complete and deliver orders,” Shipt wrote in the Shipt Shopper Hub. That means the new pay model takes into account estimated drive time from the store to the customer’s door, how many items are in the order, location, peak shopping windows and more. But Shipt isn’t sharing an exact formula for calculating pay because “each metro has unique characteristics that can affect the shopping experience.”

On the blog, Shipt also points to how similarly priced orders might pay differently as a result of the effort it takes. For example, if the order total is $100 but is only one item versus 30 items, the latter order scenario would take more effort. That means the shopper would get paid more for that order with more items. But Solis said that’s an anomaly and that the majority of shoppers don’t receive orders like that.

“To base an entire pay structure off of an anomaly like that is really concerning,” he said.

Meanwhile, Solis said he’s found discrepancies between the way Shipt talks about its formula for calculating pay. In July, Shipt published a blog post about shop time. In it, the company laid out how it thinks about things like the location of the item, size of store and more. In the original post, which has since been updated, Shipt said it did not take into account checkout time, nor was it trying to gain insight about it.

Image Credits: Willy Solis/Screenshot

After shoppers expressed frustration about it in a Facebook group, Solis noticed that Shipt deleted that part from its blog post.

Image Credits: Willy Solis/Screenshot

“They literally said they are not interested in taking into account checkout times, which is a considerable amount of time shoppers spend in stores,” Solis said.

Shipt shoppers have staged actions before, but Solis said this one is receiving the most support to date. As part of the call-to-action, Gig Workers Collective is also asking Shipt shoppers to spread the word to at least five other workers they know.

TechCrunch is awaiting comment from Shipt. We’ll update this story when we hear back.

While many industries are taking a major hit due to the ongoing pandemic, the healthcare technology market continues to grow. In fact, total healthcare-related innovation funding for H1 2020 hit $9.1 billion, up nearly 19% compared to the same period in 2019, according to StartUp Health’s 2020 Midyear Funding Report.

As the virus continues to pose new challenges for the industry, investors are rushing to pump money into startups addressing healthcare sub-sectors ranging from telemedicine to patient financial engagement.

The inefficiencies and frustrations of the U.S. healthcare system make it a tempting target for disruption-oriented VCs. But here’s the hard truth: Healthcare is unlike any other industry. It has a morass of regulations that a “move-fast-and-break-things” startup can’t handle over the long term.

Healthcare is also a sensitive, personal issue. As such, patients are inherently reluctant to adapt to new technologies, even when they’re dissatisfied with the status quo. Consequently, it’s crucial that startup technology leaders in this space understand how to wade through these unpredictable waters in order to thrive and deliver a strong ROI for investors.

Entering health technology

VCs are seeing all the latest headlines about COVID-19 and spying a potential money-making opportunity to invest capital into innovative startups. However, they must overcome barriers to entry when offering patient-focused, technology-centric solutions before they can compete with legacy players. As the saying goes, “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity,” and, within the healthcare startup space, COVID-19 presents an opportunity for those who stood ready to offer a solution to the market before the situation became a crisis.

Therefore, VC and PE investors should focus on the problem the potential startup is trying to solve as recent times have rapidly refashioned the need for certain solutions. Are there other key players leading the market, or is the startup a duplicative offering that is currently available? If the value proposition is unique, it may be interesting. If it’s not, investors may want to think twice.

Greylock Partners has teamed up with Management Leadership for Tomorrow to address issues of diversity and inclusion in the technology industry.

“Our view is this has to be a comprehensive approach,” MLT Founder and CEO John Rice told TechCrunch. “This is not just a coding program, mentor program, fellowship program. There are plenty of great ones. They’re important. But what we’re saying is you have to work on all these levers and take a long-term view. Our view is we can really move the needle exponentially to grow minority participation in the highest leverage areas of the tech ecosystem.”

For starters, the multi-faceted partnership will enable Greylock to tap into MLT’s network of around 8,000 Black, Latinx and Indigenous professionals and connect them with potential roles at the firm’s portfolio companies. Additionally, Greylock and MLT will work together to support retention at those companies, as well as help MLT professionals pursue careers in venture capital.

“Being at Greylock and seeing the tech ecosystem over the last 20 years — it’s become pretty clear that, at no surprise to us, modern technology is one of the greatest opportunities for wealth creation,” Greylock Partner David Sze told TechCrunch. “Has been one of the greatest creators for wealth and is likely to be so in the future — in the foreseeable future.”

But the greatest financial returns accrue to founders, early employees and investors. That creates this network where those early employees and alumni from top companies like Facebook or Google then go on to become founders of the next generation of startups in the wealth creation cycle, Sze said.

“And the cycle repeats itself,” Sze said.

Then, VCs are eager to back teams with people who used to work at those high-growth companies, he said.

“That’s just how the Valley works,” Sze said. “It’s a social network in and of itself. […] But the issue is that Black and Latinx and Native American people really largely have been left out of tech startups and venture capital and those networks. And as a result, it actually is a compounding factor.”

For those folks in the system, it compounds in their favor but that means for those left out, it becomes harder to figure out how to break into it, Sze said.

“And look, VCs and tech startups — we just have to be honest that we’ve been really bad at getting this right,” Sze said. “Historically, I mean, we’ve let the system sort of evolve without much top down oversight in regards of diversity and inclusion and we just really need to change that.”

That’s a key reason why Greylock and MLT are partnering to try to get more Black, Latinx and Indigenous people in these tech startups. And it’s not that there is a pipeline problem because there is plenty of available talent, Sze said. But he said that if there is a pipeline problem, “the problem is actually on our side.”

“It’s not on the talent side,” Sze said. “There is plenty of talent out there. It’s that the networks and systems that have existed and grown over time in the valley have not been conducive to allowing the inclusion of that group.”

Greylock’s partners also donated $5 million to anchor MLT’s first-ever impact fund, which allows MLT to be a limited partner in Greylock’s latest fund, a $1 billion fund.

“We have a long history with our LPs,” Sze said. “We do not let new LPs in very often and we’re super excited to have them involved because we think it’s a force multiplier.”

The hope with this partnership is that it’ll spur ideas for other collaborations with VC funds, Sze said. For Rice, he hopes that other leaders in tech will take note and get on board with moving the needle.

“Leaders need to be at this time, at this critical juncture, be much better informed about why we are where we are,” Rice said. “[…] Leaders not only need to be well-informed but also be willing to hold themselves accountable to be more informed. And that doesn’t require them to be experts on the history of racism. It requires them to understand like they understand, you know, AI and bitcoin and things like that. Understand this stuff.”

Leadership, Rice said, also looks like committing to a comprehensive approach with the same level of rigor that venture capitalists apply to how they invest in companies, and that tech companies apply to their growth.

“If we don’t have that same level of rigor in our approach and we just think that we can move the needle with random acts of diversity, then we’re done. We’re not going to move the needle. It’s going to require, you know, a comprehensive approach.”

Class is about to be in session, students. If you’re passionate about mobility and transportation tech and hungry to learn from the visionaries, makers and investors who are building the future today, don’t miss out on TC Sessions: Mobility 2020 on October 6-7.

We support you, the next generation of mobility tech leaders, so take advantage of our $50 student pass — a $145 savings. But don’t delay. The price increases on October 5.

TC Sessions: Mobility 2020 offers two days packed with 1:1 interviews and panel discussions with the people at the top of game — the leaders, movers and shakers who continue to push beyond what seems possible. You won’t just hear from them, you’ll engage with them during a series of Q&A breakout sessions.

Whether you’re focused on micromobility, connected data, EVs or regulatory trends, you’ll find it — and much more — across the main stage, breakout sessions and sponsored sessions. Here’s a taste of what to expect. Be sure to study the event agenda and start strategizing your schedule now.

Driving the Mobility Revolution with Connected Car Data: Bret Scott, Wejo VP, discusses the future of mobility and how connected car data impacts the world of autonomous, electric and shared cars.

Software is Revolutionizing the Driver Experience and Driving Mass Electrification: Software in EVs enables a shift from buying a car to investing in an experience. ChargePoint CEO, Pasquale Romano discusses how it’s driving adoption, revolutionizing behavior and keeping up with demand.

Uber’s City Footprint: Uber touches many aspects of the transportation ecosystem — autonomous vehicles, food delivery, trucking and traditional ride-hailing. Director of Policy, Cities & Transportation, Shin-pei Tsay discusses Uber’s place in cities and how she navigates various regulatory frameworks.

This virtual conference draws a global audience and thousands of attendees. Talk about the perfect place to build your network — an essential part of any successful career. Find that dream internship or exciting employment opportunities and explore more than 40 early-stage mobility startups in the expo area.

Take advantage of CrunchMatch, our free AI-enhanced networking platform. It’s an easy-to-use tool to find and connect with the people who can help you advance your startup aspirations. Stay focused and organized as you schedule 1:1 meetings, meet founders, pitch investors, discuss your resume and otherwise impress the pants off influential people.

Class is in session on October 6-7. Join your community, dazzle the experts and build a firm foundation for your future at TC Sessions: Mobility 2020. Purchase your student pass before the price increases on October 5 and save a chunk of cash.

Is your company interested in sponsoring or exhibiting at TC Sessions: Mobility 2020? Contact our sponsorship sales team by filling out this form.

In a new letter to its chief executive on the eve of the first presidential debate, the Biden campaign slammed Facebook for its failure to act on false claims about voting in the U.S. election.

In the scathing letter, published by Axios, Biden Campaign Manager Jen O’Malley Dillon specifically singled out a troubling video post the Trump campaign shared to Facebook and Twitter last week.

Over the course of that video, the president’s son claims that his father’s political opponents “plan to add millions of fraudulent ballots that can cancel your vote and overturn the election” and calls on supporters to “enlist now” in an “Army for Trump election security operation.” Those false claims appear to have inspired some Trump supporters, who plan to guard ballot drop-off sites and polling places — a form of voter intimidation that would likely constitute a federal crime.

When the Biden campaign (along with many others) flagged the video to Facebook, the company apparently said that the content would not be removed, pointing to its small, unobtrusive voting info labels that appear alongside all posts related to the 2020 U.S. election. The video remains up on Twitter with a similar label.

“We were assured that the label affixed to the video, buried on the top right corner of the screen were many viewers will miss it, should allay any concerns,” O’Malley Dillon wrote in the letter, addressed to Mark Zuckerberg.

“No company that considers itself a force for good in democracy, and that purports to take voter suppression seriously, would allow this dangerous claptrap to be spread to millions of people. Removing this video should have been the easiest of easy calls under your policies, yet it remains up today.”

In the letter, O’Malley Dillon also cites the president’s own repeated attempts to undermine national confidence in the 2020 election with unsubstantiated lies about the voting process, which is already under unique strain this year from the pandemic.

Rather than taking a strong approach to limit the reach of election-related disinformation from the president and his supporters, Facebook has largely remained hands-off. The platform is more comfortable touting its get out the vote campaign and other politically neutral efforts to inform and mobilize voters. Facebook clearly hopes those measures will offset its current role disseminating domestic disinformation from the president himself, but given the scope of what’s happening — and its lingering failures from 2016 — that doesn’t look likely.

“As you say, ‘voting is voice.’ Facebook has committed to not allow that voice to be drowned out by a storm of disinformation, but has failed at every opportunity to follow through on that commitment,” O’Malley Dillon wrote, adding that the Biden campaign would “be calling out those failures” over the course of the remaining 36 days until the election.

Polaris is a name synonymous with powersports — just head to any of the hundreds of snowmobile trails in Wisconsin, Minnesota or other sufficiently wintry place for evidence. Now, it’s teaming up with Zero Motorcycles, Santa Cruz-based maker of electric motorcycles and powertrains, to electrify its lineup.

The two companies announced Tuesday a 10-year agreement to work together to produce electrified off-road vehicles and snowmobiles using Zero’s powertrain technology, hardware and software. Polaris will develop, manufacture and sell the vehicles.

The companies will co-develop the technologies and vehicle platforms for this next generation of electrified powersports, according to Zero Motorcycles CEO Sam Paschel, adding that the aim is to dramatically expand the electric options currently in the market.

“Our EV expertise and millions of miles of real-world, rubber-meets-the-road EV experience, coupled with Polaris’ broad product portfolio, scale, supply chain and market leadership, makes this a game-changer for every powersports enthusiast,” Paschel said in a statement. 

Polaris already has several electric options in its portfolio, thanks to a series of acquisitions its made over the past decade. In 2011, the company acquired Goupil, a French manufacturer of on-road, commercial light duty electric vehicles for the European market as well as GEM, the street-legal passenger and utility electric vehicles. Polaris more recently acquired Brammo Electric Motorcycles, a purchase that gave the company access to technology that would later be used in its Ranger EV off-road vehicles.

This latest deal aims to create a broader portfolio of products, not just one offs. Polaris said the partnership will be the cornerstone of “rEV’D up,” the name of its long-term strategy to offer customers an electrified option within each of its core product segments by 2025. The first vehicle from this Zero-Polaris partnership will debut by the end of 2021.

“Thanks to advancements in power, pricing and performance over the last several years, and with customer interest surging, now is the right time for Polaris, with Zero Motorcycles as a key strategic partner, to implement our rEV’d up initiative and aggressively accelerate our position in powersports electrification,” Polaris CEO and Chairman Scott Wine said in a statement. Wine boasted the partnership will enable Polaris to “leapfrog technological hurdles around range and cost while providing a tremendous speed-to-market advantage.”

Like everywhere else, the COVID-19 pandemic created a new “no normal” at Facebook .

The seismic shifts and disruptions reverberated across the globe and we had to accept that and adjust, quickly. Suddenly, our products were more important than ever yet we had to rethink everything we had planned, including the very nature of the way we work. One of the things that helped me most was recalling the lessons learned from my days leading startups. We were frequently forced to adapt to constantly shifting priorities and changing markets. These experiences prepared me to be much more effective and agile, at-scale.

As a global organization, our first priority was to determine how we could help. We saw many governments and health agencies were already using Messenger to communicate with people in their communities about the virus. We also saw that in an environment full of so much uncertainty and fear, connecting people to reliable information about COVID-19 was absolutely paramount. Our team quickly mobilized, remotely, to help health organizations in their efforts.

In a matter of weeks we created a program in partnership with our developer community to offer free services to government and NGO health organizations around the world. Developers built tools to help agencies leverage Messenger’s unique reach and scale to provide as many people as possible with accurate information about COVID-19. This included organizations like WHO, UNICEF and many others across nearly all levels of government.

Usage was spiking across Facebook’s family of apps and we knew we would need to dramatically speed up our product roadmap. We were able to hyperaccelerate the launch of products we knew people needed. This included Messenger Desktop, a new version of the app that enables video calling on the larger desktop screen. We also launched Messenger Rooms, a free and unlimited video calling service that lets up to 50 people join a video call even if they don’t have a Facebook account. And just this week we launched Watch Together, which lets people watch videos and other entertainment while on group video calls to give them a sense of being together in-person even when they can’t be.

It also became clear to us that our efforts to stop the spread of misinformation online were now more critical than ever. While we were already focused on this, especially given the fact that there’s national elections this year in the U.S. and other countries, we could see that the many unknowns surrounding COVID-19 were fertile ground for people to send false, misleading and even dangerous information. To help combat this, we implemented new forwarding limits on the number of people or groups a message can be forwarded to at one time. We know this is an effective way to help slow the spread of viral misinformation or harmful content that can cause real-world damage.

All of these efforts have been made while our entire workforce has been remote since March. This has been an incredibly profound shift for so many people and one that will require businesses everywhere to rethink how they manage their employees. At Messenger, we were fortunate to have the resources and type of work that helped with our transition and I suspect many other companies, especially tech companies, were in a similar situation. People are now used to interacting on our screens watching each other’s children or pets pass by in the background.

The real challenge will be when more people start going back to the office. We’ve obviously done well in mode 1: “Everyone is in the office.” We’ve managed to adapt to mode 2: “Everyone is remote.” But it’s clear that companies will need to figure out how to manage their people in a hybrid remote/office environment or mode 3. I suspect that this third mode is the hardest one to nail. At Facebook we recently announced that 50% of our workforce will be remote in the next five to 10 years. It’s pretty clear that the “office” will never be the same and we’ll have to navigate that together as one organization.

As these changes settle in, people will obviously need to continue to adapt. And we will. For me, the last six months has shown that people are resilient, and that when faced with a common threat or the need to suddenly rethink everything they might know, we quickly rise to the occasion.

I saw this in our team here at Messenger as everyone dealt with their own personal struggles while still showing up (remotely, that is) everyday and actually overdelivering on the new aggressive goals and deadlines we set for ourselves.

I’m very proud of the Messenger team, and the way we’ve been able to adapt and serve people who use the service, and each other, during this unprecedented time.

Despite being under antitrust investigations in U.S. and E.U., Facebook today is rolling out a new feature that highlights the extent to which its suite of apps now interoperate. The company this morning introduced a consumer-facing tool called “Accounts Center,” which is found in the Settings section of Facebook, Instagram and Messenger. The feature aims to give users the ability to manage their connected experiences across Facebook-owned apps, like Single Sign On and Facebook Pay, for example.

In Accounts Center, users will be able to optionally turn on or off Single Sign On, an authentication option that  allows you to do things like use your Facebook account information to log into Instagram or to recover your accounts.

Image Credits: Facebook

In the new settings area, you’ll also be able to make adjustments to how your Stories post — for instance, whether you want your Stories to publish to both Facebook and Instagram at the same time.

Though not available at launch, Facebook says it will add Facebook Pay to the Accounts Center later this year. In the U.S., you’ll then be able to enter your payment information in one place then use it across both Facebook and Instagram when you make purchases, like in the new Facebook and Instagram Shops, or when you make donations.

Facebook says users who choose to use Accounts Center won’t have to publicly use the same identity across all of Facebook. You could, for instance, continue to use a personal profile on Facebook while using Instagram to promote your business or hobbies. But the feature will likely be more useful for those who do maintain the same identify across platforms, as you can do things like sync your profile photo across apps.

The new feature, however, brings to light the extensive data collection operation Facebook has built by way of its various apps. In a blog post, Facebook clearly states that it uses information from across its suite of apps to personalize your experience, including which ads are shown. In other words, even if you maintain different identities publicly, Facebook is aggregating your data behind the scenes. This allows it to maintain its market dominance in social and potentially stifle new competition. This matter has been at the forefront of the U.S. government’s antitrust investigations, and elsewhere, which are still ongoing.

Without intervention from regulators, Facebook isn’t slowing on plans to make its suite of apps ever more interoperable. This summer, for example, it began testing the merger of Instagram and Messenger chats. Those efforts continue today.

Facebook says the test of the new Accounts Center will begin this week across Facebook, Instagram and Messenger.

Though TikTok is in the middle of fighting off the Trump administration’s attempt to ban its app in the U.S. over data privacy concerns, the company today is launching a new feature focused on the 2020 U.S. elections. TikTok announced this morning it’s introducing an in-app guide to the elections offering its 100 million U.S. users with information about the candidates, details about how to vote, and educational videos about misinformation, media literacy, the elections process and more.

The company, however, is not producing this content itself. It’s leaving that up to partner organizations, including the National Association of Secretaries of State, BallotReady, SignVote, and several others.

BallotReady, for example, will power the elections guide with detailed information about the candidates at the federal, state and local level, in both English and Spanish. Details about how to vote in every state are offered by National Association of Secretaries of State. MediaWise will provide the educational videos about spotting misinformation and the elections process, as well as how to vote.

The effort will also include resources for voters in different circumstances, TikTok says. This includes information about voting as a person with disabilities, from SignVote; as someone overseas, through the Federal Voting Assistance Program; as a student with help from Campus Vote Project; and as a person with past convictions, with help from Restore Your Vote.

TikTok will feature this elections guide starting today in the U.S., where it will be accessible both on the TikTok Discover page and on election-related search results. It will also feature the guide at the bottom of videos relating the elections and on videos posted by verified political candidates, it says.

The company preemptively explains it only verifies accounts to indicate the authenticity of the account ownership, but the verified badge does not indicate TikTok’s endorsement. The issue around what it means to be verified on a social network is a problem Twitter has faced for years, as it doled out its coveted verified badges to controversial figures, like white nationalists.

Though TikTok is working with established partners to put its elections guide together, the mere act of involving itself in any way in American politics right now is a fairly bold choice on the company’s part. As users interact with the new elections guide, they could be sharing additional signals about their political leanings.

In theory, these signals could be used to tweak their personalized recommendations, like those shown on TikTok’s For You page, for example. But TikTok could also store this signal data with the user’s TikTok account for future use. That’s not all that different from how Facebook is able to identify your leanings by parsing your profile information or the Pages you’ve “liked.”

TikTok, however, says it won’t be collecting any users’ personal information with the launch of the guide, nor will it use the signals to customize your experience.

“…A user must visit the website for a state or a non-profit for anything that involves sharing their information, including registering to vote,” the company stated, in an announcement. “Interactions with this guide in our app have no bearing on future TikTok experiences, such as recommendations or ads.”

Despite the controversies surrounding TikTok’s ownership, many social networks today are offering voter guides or running “get out the vote” campaigns in their apps.

Facebook rolled out voting resources to U.S. users this August, and Twitter debuted its Elections hub earlier this month. Snapchat said it helped 400,000 people get registered to vote. YouTube, meanwhile, recently began adding vetted information about mail-in voting to counter misinformation along with a few features that encourage users to register to vote.

Even Tinder is running a promotion in the U.S. to drive voter registration through the use of in-app cards that direct users to online resources.

However, TikTok’s voter registration efforts could be impactful because of its younger, Gen Z user base. For decades, youth voters fail show up at the polls. And every election year, reports wonder if this year will be any different.

But TikTok users, in particular, have been politically motivated in recent months. Some helped to prank the Trump campaign by registering for tickets to Trump’s Tulsa rally, which they didn’t intend to use. They also trolled the official Trump campaign app to the point that it finally had to reset its App Store ratings. And many went on the app to troll their parents’ political choices.

To what extent TikTok’s young users will transition from being armchair activists to real-world voters –if they’re even of age — remains to be seen. And though news coverage has focused on left-leaning TikToker’s, the app can easily direct you to the pro-Trump bubble where you’ll find plenty of MAGA hat-sporting teens. Like the rest of the U.S., teens on TikTok have their own political divides. That means even if TikTok is successful in boosting youth voter turnout, there’s no reason to believe it will necessarily help sway the vote one way or the other.

The venture capital world is rapidly changing, and thank heavens we have two of the smartest VCs on the future of investing, productivity tools, and remote work joining us today to make sense of all the noise.

On Extra Crunch Live today, Sarah Cannon and Nina Achadjian, two VC partners based in Index Ventures’ SF office, will talk about these subjects and more. Plus, we will be taking questions from the audience, so come prepared. Login details are below the fold for EC members, and if you don’t have an Extra Crunch membership, click through to signup.

As I wrote when we announced the slate last week:

First, we have Nina Achadjian, who officially joined Index Ventures several years ago out of the firm’s SF office and was promoted to partner earlier this year. Achadjian has been searching for and investing into some of the most interesting new collaborative companies that are rebuilding the enterprise from the ground up (which happens to have been a brilliant move given our remote-work world this year). Her investments include such companies as product-management service productboard, sales performance platform Gong, executive assistant marketplace Double and real estate services platform ServiceTitan.

Second, we have Sarah Cannon, who joined Index in 2018 from CapitalG, and who is also based officially out of SF. Cannon made a splash earlier this year with her bullish bet on note-taking and team productivity wunderkind Notion, and has also invested in productivity tools like collaborative presentation software Pitch and smart team messaging app Quill.

Join us today at 2pm EDT / 11am PDT / 6pm GMT.

Event Details